About Willie

Former CEO of international companies
Columbia Business School professor
Consultant to global organizations for creating winning strategies.
Creator of the Strategic Learning Process.
Author of the book, Strategic Learning

WATCH VIDEO   ▶

Willie's Blog Posts

The Latest Post

Why Strategy Is In Trouble

“Strategic thinking rarely occurs spontaneously. Without guidelines, few managers know what constitutes strategic thinking.”  - Michael Porter Recently an executive at a company seeking my advice sent me an email with a revealing typo: “We are in the mist of our strategic planning process” he explained. I soon learned how true this was. The organization’s strategy development process was mired in a fog of complexity and confusion. Unfortunately, this story...

Read the full article

Past Posts

Why Strategy Is In Trouble

Want a Breakthrough Idea? Take a Hike

Five Time-Tested Ideas for Success

New Year’s Resolution: Escape the Calendar

Escaping the Tyranny of the Day-To-Day

Learning How To Learn

Great Decisions: An Art of Sacrifice

Why Strategy Is Everyone’s Job

The Strategy Q&A

What I Learned About Leadership From My Dog

Von Clausewitz on War: Six Lessons for the Modern Strategist

The Lessons of the Blind Men and the Elephant

Strategy Creation vs. Implementation: Avoiding the Trap

Outside-In Thinking: Crucial but Unnatural

Strategy At A Crossroads

What Nelson Mandela Taught the World About Leadership

Read more blog posts »
wpietersen

Meet Willie

“If an organization can’t define its Winning Proposition in a simple way, it cannot claim to have a strategy.”
—from Strategic Learning

Willie Pietersen was raised in South Africa, and received a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford University. After practicing law, he embarked on an international business career. Over a period of twenty years he served as the CEO of multibillion-dollar businesses such as Lever Foods, Seagram USA, Tropicana and Sterling Winthrop’s Consumer Health Group.

In 1998, Pietersen was named Professor of the Practice of Management at the Columbia University Graduate School of Business. He specializes in strategy and the leadership of change, and his methods and ideas, especially Strategic Learning, are widely applied within Columbia’s executive education programs, and also in numerous corporations.

Full Bio

Strategic Learning
Develop strategies for long-term competitive advantage. Read more Buy
The Workbook
A toolkit for applying the Strategic Learning method. Read more Buy